It is often desirable to know the location of a portable wireless computing device to enable entities other than a user of the wireless computing device to, e.g., see whether a friend or family member is close the entity and provide services and tailor advertisements to the user based on his or her location. However, this desire must be balanced by the user's desire to control the ability of others to obtain his or her location.
In the field of systems that determine the location of wireless computing devices while balancing the user's privacy and security considerations, U.S. Pat. No. 6,138,003 (Kingdon et al.) describes a telecommunications system and method that performs authorization checks prior to allowing a location service to position a mobile terminal within a cellular network. The various checks involve ensuring that the requesting agency has authorization to request positioning of mobile terminals, determining whether positioning of mobile terminals is allowed within the cellular network that the mobile terminal is currently located in, verifying the authenticity of the identity of the mobile positioning center, ascertaining whether the mobile subscriber has allowed the requesting agency to position the mobile terminal, and confirming that all relevant criteria for positioning have been met by both the mobile subscriber and the requesting agency.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,359,716 (Rowitch et al.) describes a system that controls authorization of a location determination function of a mobile device. The system considers location determination and location disclosure as separate and independent processes whereby location determination is performed, when necessary, via a first set of network entities to obtain location information for a mobile station and then cached for subsequent disclosure to any number of applications. Location disclosure is performed (when requested) via a second set of network entities to provide the location information. Location determination utilizes a first security procedure for authorization and to obtain a first session key used for location determination. Location disclosure utilizes a second security procedure for authorization and to obtain a second session key used for location disclosure. For a roaming mobile station, location determination is performed via a serving network and location disclosure is performed via a home network.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,505,757 (Rowitch et al.) describes a system that performs location determination by triggering a location-based application to run within a mobile station of a communication system. The application is executed within the mobile station and is triggered only by a network element, such as a mobile positioning center coupled to a base station. The network element authorizes the application that is resident within the mobile station, or run in a device resident elsewhere in the network. The mobile station communicates with the network element over a communication link through the base station and other infrastructure components. The mobile station will only respond to attempts to trigger particular operations, e.g., run particular applications, if the mobile station receives a short message services that includes an SMS Teleservice Identifier that has a particular pre-assigned value.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,600,253 (Wang) describes a system that manages delivery of services between entities, e.g., a person or company asset, based on tokens.
U.S. Pat. Appln. Publ. No. 2004/0203903 (Wilson et al.) describes a system for providing wireless telecommunication services to mobile devices while managing permissions for location-based services. One method includes receiving a stop request with respect to one mobile device to stop other mobile devices from receiving location information with respect to that mobile device. The method updates a central database based on the received stop request, and prohibits other mobile devices from receiving location information with respect to that mobile device until a request to remove the stop is received. Moreover, the system provides options to protect a user's privacy by enabling users to turn off the location feature. As such, users must grant permission before someone else can add them to the list of people he or she can locate. Once granted, users can revoke permission at any time, halting access by any or all individuals to their location information. Once a user gives someone permission to locate his or her phone, that person can do so any time the phone is on unless the user turns off the locating ability to make the phone go “invisible” or revokes access for that person. To prevent unwanted requests, users can permanently block a person from re-requesting access to their location. Further, the system may share a user's location only with parties a user has expressly authorized to receive the user's location.
In spite of the foregoing methods and systems of the prior art, improvements in the management of access to information about a mobile device are needed.